We left Chefchaouen and travelled by CTM bus to Tangiers, and spent one night there in Riad Tingis. Then an early taxi to the port at Tangiers to get on the ferry to Tarifa, where we were met by a taxi to take us to Algeciras, to pick up an Europcar rental car. Efforts to get there by 1.00 pm just failed, when the Spanish siesta kicked in, so we had to wait until 4.30pm for the office to open again.
Finally all went well and we drove up past several 'white villages' to Ronda. Prep for Ronda is here.
Ronda Gorge and the lower 'Old Bridge' (aka Puente Viejo).
We then drove from Ronda to Seville and checked in to our AirBnB flat. Prep for Seville is here.
We arrived on the second to last day of the Feria de Abril, a special celebration every year for Sevillians. Imagine the Melbourne Cup running for a week and it will give you some idea. People strut their stuff with fancy clothes and horse drawn carriages.
The Feria featured a major bullfight on the last day. Without endorsing bullfighting, we thought it was an opportunity to see what actually happens. (Some of the following pictures may upset).
The bandolero's job is to run at the charging bull, stick a couple of sharpened sticks, like cricket stumps covered with ribbons, into its back, and not get gored. No distracting cape. What could possibly go wrong?
Sebastián Castella is France's top bullfighter. He had been gored by a bull in the past.
Take a bucket, and pour paint from several paint pots of primary colours into it. Stir several times. Then try to talk sensibly about the colour you are left with, and the contribution of each original pot.
Morocco is a bit like that. There is Islam, which is obviously extremely important to the great majority of people. There is a monarchy. Most people appear to respect the King, but certainly some do not. We were told by one of the latter that 25% of the budget goes on the Kings various palaces.
My drone was confiscated by customs (and later retrieved) and we were told that the reason that drones were illegal in Morocco was because the King does not want people to know what happens behind his palace walls.
Morocco is a third-world country. The GDP per capita is US$3,300. For comparison the Australian figure is seventeen times higher, at about US$56,000, the US figure is US$53,000, and the UK figure is US$42,500. For Bali, where we went last year, the figure is US$2,400.
Like Bali, Morocco has also been exposed to mass tourism, especially from European countries nearby.
It is often described as one of the most liberal countries in the Middle East. (Middle East is a proxy word that probably means Arab, or Islamic, rather than a geographical position.) I was interested in the idea that Morocco is exceptional. Most of the Arab world has populations that are majority Arab, in the sense of race and language. Morocco is apparently 2/3rds Berber, and 1/3rd Arab. There are important cultural and linguistic differences between Arabs and Berbers. One of our guides, who was a Berber, asked us the usual question: 'Where are you from?' We gave the usual answer; 'Australia', to which the usual reply is 'Ah, Kangaroo!'. He was different. He said 'Ah, Aborigines!'
'Berbers are the aborigines of Morocco'.
As always, distinctions are often seen differently by different people. Some people, especially Berbers, told us there were very important and persisting distinctions between Berbers and Arabs. Others, especially Arabs, said that the two groups had been mixed together for hundreds of years and everyone was a sort of Arab/Berber blend. NY Times article here.
As far as impressions go, we thought that Moroccans seemed mostly a rather sad and suppressed culture. The position of women was apparently quite unenviable, worse in Marrakech, and better in the north, particularly Chefchaouen. We heard hardly any music or singing. We saw relatively few people having a joke with each other. It was quite hard to find a Moroccan with whom one could have a chat that didn't degenerate into some sort of commercial interaction, 'Gimme money to take my photo.' Or 'Gimme money for giving you directions'.
The food was pretty bland and repetitive, in spite of ingredients and fresh produce being easily available.
Compared to 1969/70 (when I was last there) there were several differences. I got the impression that the population had increased markedly. Records suggest it doubled from 17 million in 1975 to 35 million now. There appeared to be a lot of unemployed or underemployed men wandering the streets, or doing trivial work.
Some of the different impressions might have stemmed from changes in myself. People behave differently towards an impoverished student of 20, compared to an old white man who might represent a financial opportunity.
In 1970, Marrakech seemed to me very exotic and vibrant. Now it seemed somewhat degraded, and the country needed development that had passed it by, or been misapplied.
Some of the best conversations we had were with the guides we hired at different stages. Once we had established a relationship, and some mutual trust, it was possible to go 'off piste' a bit and ask opinions about political or religious matters. The latter was a bit more sensitive. I asked one guide, in the context of us admiring some magnificent old Islamic architecture, how his people made sense of the Moors being so advanced in science, medicine, architecture, etc, until some time after the Reconquista (when the Christians drove the Moors out of Spain in 1492), and the relative rise of the West and the decline of Islam ever since. (The question was intended to raise the topic of the European Enlightenment, the equivalent of which appears to have eluded Islamic countries).
He was an intelligent man, a teacher of languages at secondary school. His reply surprised me. 'We lost our belief in pure Islam'.
The conversation dried up then. We were travelling in the area where two young Scandinavian women back-packers had just been beheaded by Islamic radicals.
There were some other things we noticed. Pretty much wherever we went, we saw large unfinished and unoccupied houses. They were like ugly concrete Moroccan McMansions. A huge proportion of them had bristles of rusty reo sticking out of the corners of their roofs, as if there was a plan one day to add another story.
See the reo bristles
What could this mean? Huge investments in grandiose unfinished real estate. Minimal investment in the most rudimentary agricultural machinery. Old women sitting on the ground clipping grass to feed to donkeys, where a small tractor would have been much more productive.
My suspicion is that a lot of the workforce travels to Europe and sends back remittances, and they visit a few weeks a year and dream of having a big house. No doubt singing (silently) 'If I were a rich man, diddle diddle..'
Another incongruity was the difference between old architecture, much of which was sublime, and the mass of modern buildings that looked crude and jerry-built.
One complicating factor was the culture's approach to internal and external space. The outsides of buildings that we stayed in were often very nondescript, yet inside they were very beautiful.
Dar Seffarine riad in Fez
Leaving Morocco and going to Spain, a one hour ferry ride, produced a dramatic difference in many things, perhaps most obviously in the appearance and behaviour of women. In Morocco, they were mostly covered up, and vigorously opposed having their photo taken. In Spain they welcomed photos and posed for us in their finery.
Chefchaouen is famous for being a pretty town with lots of blue buildings, and also for hashish.
The history is complex. An overview of the history of Spain and North Africa is here. A key date to remember is 1492, the year of the Reconquista (reconquest) of Spain by Christian forces under Isabel and Fernando. They evicted the Moors (Muslims), who had ruled most of Spain from 711.
Fernando of Aragon and Isabel of Castilla
The deal they offered the Jews and Muslims was essentially to get out, or convert to Christianity. Isabel and Fernando started the Spanish Inquisition (which nobody expected) to flush out people who claimed that they had converted in order to stay, but hadn't really.
The other thing that happened in 1492 was that they funded Christopher Columbus' voyage to America, which lead to huge quantities of gold coming to Spain, and the booming of the Spanish economy.
Chefchaouen came into this story by being the destination of a lot of refugees, both Jewish and Moorish, fleeing from Spain and setting up their town. It has a number of Spanish features.
We found Chefchaouen to be friendlier than Fez or Marrakech. Those seriously over-touristed cities were full of people who saw us as a potential source of money, so every interaction, such as an offer to help us find our way if we were lost, turned eventually into a demand for money, or an offer to show us a shop from which a commission might be earned. But here in Chaouen, we had several encounters with people apparently for the fun of talking to us.
These young women were dressing up and playing with friends who had drums and horns.
The town is very cute, and there is a corny photo around every corner.
There is a famous Chinese curse: 'May you live in interesting times!'
I think an equivalent one for today might be: 'May your home be listed as a top destination on Tripadvisor for people pursuing their Bucket List!'
People from all over the world will clog your streets and take photos of you and your house!
We rented a car and drove in from Chefchaouen to explore the Rif Mountains and went for a bush-walk. Stunning!
God's Bridge at Akchour
We drove north to a beach on the Mediterranean coast called Oued Laou and had a big lunch at a seafood restaurant.
